Better Health: Smart Health Commentary Better Health (TM): smart health commentary

Article Comments

Voice Transcription Adventures With A Southern Accent

The patient has fluferculosis, buperculosis, conbumption, arg!

The patient has fluferculosis, buperculosis, conbumption, arg!

I’ve dictated charts since I started private practice 16 years ago.  Although I like to think that I’m pretty good with the English language, it turns out that when I speak it, I mumble, slur and frequently dictate things that make no sense to the transcriptionist.

A standard chart for me might look like this:

‘This 44-year-old_____ complains of several days of ______ severe in the_______right______explosive and sudden in quanset.  (Unable to understand physician)….and stated that she(he) {please clarify} would not be short of ______ usually has no pain in _____ when she (he) falls onto the crown?’

Now, this is difficult enough, as you might expect.  And  often worse when I’m finishing a night shift, and the chart says ‘the patient is awake, alert and sleeping quietly at discharge,zzzzz.’

But voice transcription takes it to a new level.  No blanks, no question marks, it just says what it thinks I’m saying.  Now, let me interject with the fact that I think this is an excellent system, and I’m just getting started  on it; but the learning curve is entertaining.

So, the machine asks me to try saying some things.  Sample letters, so I can learn the computer and it can learn me.

Sample:

Dear Albert,

‘Thank you for your recent letter.  I hope you and your family are enjoying your new home in Phoenix.’

Sincerely,

Robert

Mind you, I have to include all punctuation.  ‘Dear Albert comma quotation mark, thank you for your recent letter period I hope you and your family are enjoying your new home in Phoenix period quotation mark

Sincerely comma

Robert

Which comes out, on voice recognition,

Rotation dark fear wal-mart donna loquacious harken condor rank and file boom door piquant feather serious night rope rope who sand four heartily wart singing or flu dome send penis furious donation bark

sinfully donna

robaxin

It’s only going to get better!

Edwin

*This blog post was originally published at edwinleap.com*


You may also like these posts

Read comments »


Return to article »

Leave a Reply

Latest Interviews

Health Tips For Back-To-School

I was lucky enough to be asked by one of the local TV stations to talk about some back-to-school issues when it comes to health. I don t know about where you re at but most of the local schools around here started yesterday August rd Keeping up-to-date on immunizations…

Read more »

“Medical Self-Care” And The Doc Tom Interview

Next in our series of posts about our founder Doc Tom. Previous time capsules and Come ye economics buffs and algebra fans Get out your pencils and solve for x n and XX Whatever else the year XX is remembered for it will without a doubt go down in history…

Read more »

See all interviews »

Latest Cartoon

cardiaccath

Here’s a cartoon I created a few years back. Enjoy!

- Dr. Val

*This blog post was originally published at Science-Based Medicine*

See all cartoons »

Latest Book Reviews

A Biomedical Look At Spaceflight

Book review by Dan Buckland Dan Buckland is an editor at Medgadget and an MD PhD student at Harvard Med MIT whose thesis deals with diagnosing back injury in spaceflight using ultrasound. Mary Roach author of previous entertaining books Bonk a history of sex research and Stiff a history of…

Read more »

UTI and “Eat, Pray, Love”

I really didn t expect to like Eat Pray Love. In fact since its publication in I’d been avoiding it like the plague. Typical new-agey Oprah-y girly-book I thought. Nothing in it to speak to me. Then I saw the trailer for the movie and I was hooked probably because…

Read more »

Will Science Succeed With An Anti-Aging Revolution?

Wouldn’t it be great if we could find a way to prolong our lives and to keep us healthy right up to the end Ponce de León never found that Fountain of Youth but science is still looking. What are the chances science will succeed How’s it doing so far…

Read more »

See all book reviews »